[A composite volume : containing The ballads and songs of Ayrshire ...

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THE HEIR OF LESTNE.
" lie make thee keeper of my forest,
Both of the wild dere and the tame ;
For but I reward thy bounteous heart,
I wis, good fellowe, I were to blame."
" Now well-a-day 1" sayth Joan o' the Scales :
"Now well-a-day! and woe is my life!
Yesterday I was lady of Linne,
Now Ime but John o' the Scales his wife."
" Now fare-thee-well," said the heir of Linne
" Farewell now, John o' the Scales," said hee :
" Christ's curse light on me, if ever again
I bring my lands in jeopardy."
This ballad was first brought to light by Bishop Percy in 1755.
In his
I
" Reliques" he says— " The original of this ballad is found in the Editor's
I
folio MS., the breaches and defects in which render the insertion of supplemental
stanzas necessary. These it is hoped the reader will pardon, as
indeed the completion of the story was suggested by a modern ballad on
{ a similar subject. From the Scottish phrases here and there discernible
in this poem, it should seem to have been originally composed beyond the
i
Tweed. The heir of Linne appears not to have been a lord of Parliament,
but a laird, whose title went along with his estate," Motherwell
I
says— " The traditionary version extant in Scotland begins thus
:
" The bonnie heir, the weel-faured heir.
And the wearie heir o' Linne
Yonder he stands at his father's gate,
And naebody bids him come in.
O, see where he gangs, and see where he stands.
The weary heir o' Linne
O, see where he stands on the eauld causey,
Some ane wuld ta'en him in.
But if he had been his father's heir,
Or yet the heir o' Linne,
He wadna stand on the cauld causey,
Some ane wuld ta'en him in."
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